Kennedy Thoughts

Reason Online ponders Ted Kennedy's passing.

"Indeed, upwards of 70 percent of Americans fear that a compulsory national system will diminish the quality of their care, and 77 percent expect costs to rise. Americans are not being ideological on the issue. They are simply being realistic. Back in the '60s, when Kennedy was a young senator with presidential ambitions, large majorities of Americans wanted the government to get more involved in education, health care, and other aspects of day-to-day life. We fear it now because government did in fact become more involved in every aspect of our lives, both public and intimate. We know from bitter experience that, whatever its intentions, the government (especially the federal government) is not particularly good at delivering the sort of individualized, ultra-responsive customer service that the private sector is itself only recently figuring out."